The Morse Alphabet

The Morse alphabet is without doubt a universal language. It was developed in the 1830s by the American Samuel Morse for the purpose of transmitting information by electric telegraph. Even if it has been used for over 180 years, being one of the most widely known and used codes, it still represents an essential means of communication for the armed forces.

Consisting of various combinations of short and long signals, the alphabet developed by Samuel Morse indirectly prepared the basis for today’s telephony. He identified the most used letters and associated them with short sounds (e – a single dot). Those rarely used were assigned long sounds. The inventor’s concept was later improved, the sounds being transposed into radio or even mechanical or visual signals (long or short).

In 1912, the international distress signal – SOS – was created, consisting of three dots, three dashes, and again three dots. Later it was assigned the meaning Save Our Souls.

The Morse alphabet is also called the Morse code and consists of the following signs:

A    ._                B   _ …

C   _ . _ .          D    _ . .
E     .                F     . . _ .
G   _ _ .            H    . . . .
I   . .                   J   . _ _ _
K    _ . _            L  . _ . .
M   _ _               N  _ .
O   _ _ _            P   . _ _ .
Q   _ _ . _           R   . _ .
S   . . .                T   _
U   . . _              V   . . .
W   . _ _            X  _ . . _
Y   _ . _ _          Z   _ _ . .

1   . _ _ _ _      2  . . _ _ _
3  . . . _ _         4   . . . . _
5    . . . . .          6   _ . . . .
7    _ _ . . .        8   _ _ _ . .
9   _ _ _ _ .       0   _ _ _ _ _

@    ._ _._.

For those who want to learn this type of communication, there is a web application – http://www.morse.ro – to help you hear everything you write using this code.